The Life Center in Needham, MA seeks to create a more vibrant downtown – shopping, eating, art, and theatre. The site is situated on what is now Greene’s Field Park. This park has defined the boundary of the Urban and Suburban since its inception by the Greene’s’ in 1989. The Greene’s’ set this green space aside for the pleasure of the community. The Life Center seeks to enhance this idea of giving back to the community, while reinvigorating the urban fabric and sustaining green open spaces for the community.

Through my site analysis I looked at parking, commuter rail, public transit, and other means of circulation. I took the ratio of facility size to usage, and derived a simulation that would flow toward the site avoiding the current buildings. This simulation showed a hierarchy of site entry that I would use to orient the building, and to massage the buildings form to accommodate its surroundings.

The South portion of the site was to extend the urban street wall, and open its facade toward the West. The Northern portion of the building was a primary circulation route, so it was important to show the users where to enter the building. While taking the Baker House, into consideration, a dormitory designed by Alvar Aalto, just as the Baker House used the stairs extruded from the surface to point toward the entrance of the building. I utilized the forms skin to formally pronounce the buildings entry. When one enters the building they are in a open transitory space, both visually and sometimes physically. Adjacent to this glass box are two larger programmatic spaces, one to the North, and one to the South. The North program contains, Art, Music, Dining, and a Green roof – for farming and relaxing. The South program contains, lobby, classrooms, library, computer room, and an exercise room. Open green spaces are situated adjacent to the glass box on the Eastern side of the site, acting as a transition between a large urban building and the Suburban fabric.

The idea of this hot wire cutter is to have the ability to reach behind the material to create super amorphic shapes. Unlike a router attachment that can only affect the surface, and has a difficult time reaching behind material. The advantage of a kinetic hot wire, is that you can expand and contract the wire, which will change the overall shape of the hotwire. The rigidity of a flat wire allows the contraction of the shape to return to its initial destination.

Flow from Downstairs to Upstairs

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Thom Boessel
Michael Velentzas
Rilwan Kujenya

Michael Velentzas & Thom Boessel

This is a mockup of the radial hot wire attachment. There is a lot of shake in the wire. I am not too concerned about the shake, because the wire gauge used is 5x thinner than the final wire. I do have concerns about the stepper motor. At slow speeds stepper motors notch to a position rather than a smooth transition.

There is a video coming soon.

The site is situated on what is now Greene’s Field Park. The town has been in debate the past twenty years on whether or not to fund a senior center in Needham, MA. What has made the debate even worse is the site selected. The park selected would eliminate the current open space, and allocate that to the senior center. Our task is to mediate both parties. To provide open space for play, and to provide enclosed space for seniors and the community. The site sits on the edge of what one might think of as a downtown, shopping and a town hall. Adjacent to the East side of the site is the beginning of a residential neighborhood. The north edge of the site is where the current senior center is; all 1,500 sq. ft. of it. The differentiation between a life center and a senior center is the involvement of different age groups. The hope is to facilitate interaction between children and elderly to share knowledge and stories. I am using program and form to facilitate these interactions, creating hierarchy in circulation for all ages to meet in certain spaces.